


save yourself

by delizeita



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Betrayal, Character Death, Dark, Gen, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Magically Powerful Harry Potter, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Psychological Horror, Reincarnation, Resurrection, Time Loop, Time Travel, Time Travel Gone Wrong, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-08
Updated: 2020-10-08
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:40:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26876080
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/delizeita/pseuds/delizeita
Summary: Here is the fact Harry only realises once he learns that he is going to die.Hereallywants to live.And he does. Instead of waking up at a white King's Cross Station, Harry wakes up in his cupboard. Again, and again, and again.He really should have listened when they told him'be careful what you wish for'.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 69





	save yourself

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Harry knows he is going to die, but all he really wants is to live.

The snitch is cold against his lips as it hums and whirs open, mechanics and magic working together to reveal the Gaunt family ring nestled in a hidden compartment. A strange feeling resonates within Harry, and something clicks into place as he carefully removes it from its golden hiding place. The Resurrection Stone it holds is ice cold against his palm, but that doesn't stop him from clutching it like a lifeline.

Harry doesn't really understand betrayal on a personal level.

But then again, he has always held the world at arm's length, and his overwhelmingly famous feat as a baby has attracted him more than enough unwanted attention. He values privacy, and it seemed like every person he met wanted to get to know him, the Boy-Who-Lived, simply so they could boast about it to their acquaintances. Whispers and stares had followed him down the halls of Hogwarts for as long as he could remember. 

He's lost count how many times he's met someone new, and managed to maintain small talk for less than a minute before they'd asked about his scar, or whether he remembered anything about what happened that night. It was like none of them actually stopped to think that they were asking a child to recount to them the details of how his parents were brutally murdered. 

No matter how much the adults waxed poetic about his James and Lily Potter, it didn't stop Harry from feeling a strange disconnect between the stories of the cutest Hogwarts romance of the decade and the faceless people who were Harry's parents. 

While he smiles on the surface as Sirius tells him about James and Lily fighting and falling in love, or little bits about his own childhood, or how they had loved him so much, Harry often feels more apathetic than not. The mention of their names brings up a sort of abject curiosity and wistful longing in him, unaccompanied by the strong love and sadness that everyone expected him to feel.

Of course, Harry loves the couple who had given up their lives for him, but it was more distanced, like how one would admire the actions of heroes before their time from a textbook description of a biography. He is grateful to them, but he doesn't really feel a connection because he never really knew them, or even remembered them.

When he shared with Neville how he felt about his parents, Neville had hesitated for a second, before replying, "Really, Harry, don't feel bad about it. I mean," he scratched his neck and sighed quietly, "I see my parents in St. Mungo's every now and then, and it honestly feels… weird, almost, to think of them as my parents when I don't even know them."

Harry smiled at him and Neville had smiled back, both glad that it wasn't just them.

Family is a foreign concept to Harry, one that remained so until he met Sirius and the Weasleys practically adopted him. Growing up with the Dursleys had done nothing good for his self-esteem and interpersonal skills. As such, it is even harder for him to reconcile the image of Lily Evans and James Potter with the one of his Mum and Dad.

For years he was bewildered by his lack of feeling towards them, because hadn't the Mirror of Erised shown him an image of them standing all together as his strongest desire? 

It took him longer than it should have to realise that Harry was only taken by the idea of having a family. A picture perfect normal life. Of course, Harry misses them and was grateful for their sacrifice, but he didn't - and never had - wanted them specifically.

He's more than happy with any member of the patchwork family he's built himself.

But that little secret will stay buried in the deepest parts of his heart. Even so, he can't help but feel a little bit of guilt towards his parents. They gave him their lives, and he can't even give them his love.

He can see it now in hindsight, but Harry dealt with his guilt by converting it into his resolve to be better - because that was his responsibility as the Chosen One, no matter how many semi-competent adults he was surrounded by. He responded to his negative emotions and the challenges he faced by working harder and striving for some sort of posthumous approval, just to feel some sort of connection to them and absolve his guilt. Even if he doesn't love them, he can at least make them proud.

Harry did this almost subconsciously, freely giving his manipulators another tool to use against him, with Dumbledore being the main one. He never even noticed. He guesses it was the result of a neglectful upbringing with little to no personal connections before being dumped in a world that expected him to be something he wasn't. There were people who wanted him, loved him, but it was easy to see they'd never really seen him. Only the celebrity they expected him to be.

Even with all his defences and misgivings, it was merely by chance that the only people he'd let into his heart had grown to be as loyal as he is. His patchwork family is small and relatively exclusive, but Harry would die for each and every person in it.

As a result, Harry doesn't really understand betrayal on a personal level, because he didn't let many people close enough to try.

 _But this_ , Harry absently thinks as he walks to his death, _this is probably what it feels like_.

Betrayal has a bitter tang to it, sharp and tart in his mouth. His heart aches in his chest, and the world feels darker and more ominous than he's ever known it to be. 

This isn't his fault. He's a neglected child who had been thrust into an unfamiliar world, before being told that he was now the figurehead of a war his parents had given their lives for.

No one told him anything, but didn't hesitate to guiltlessly thrust him into a wild goose chase for horcruxes, severely misinformed and underprepared. His entire life has been planned to some extent, giving him deep-seated trust issues, a lack of respect for authority, a feeling of responsibility and a lack of self-worth. It hurts to even think of the conclusion. They weren't raising a hero, they were conditioning a martyr. A child. He hasn't even begun to live, but he's been raised to die.

All his pain, just for _this_.

Once he learnt that he was going to die, Harry had a cruel realisation. His only, truly selfish wish was that he _really_ wanted to live. But then again, it was either him or them. It wasn't much of a choice, to be honest.  
And now, the way he was walking to his death willingly made that realisation sink in even deeper.

Walking into the clearing where Voldemort awaits him is the most difficult thing he had ever forced himself to do. Pulling off the Invisibility Cloak that shields him and tucking it in his pocket is even more difficult. 

_It's all for them_ , he tells himself again, clenching the ring in a white-knuckled fist and feeling the angular Resurection stone cutting into his skin. _Everything is for them_. 

Voldemort and his Death Eaters are silent, standing amongst the trees across him. Hagrid is tearfully yelling something at him from where he was tied up, but Harry can't hear them over the sound of rushing water in his ears.

"Harry Potter," Voldemort breathes out, long fingers stroking the Elder Wand almost reverently. 

Harry understands that he's been living on borrowed time since he survived the Killing Curse as a baby, but he never expected he would die like this. He wants to live _so badly_ but he doesn't have a choice in the matter. Like he ever had a choice in anything, really. The thought of Dumbledore's betrayal still sends spikes of pain through his chest.

Voldemort's voice soft yet commanding, and in that moment his eyes were triumphant. "The Boy-Who-Lived," he whispers, "come to die."

He wants to live.

Harry's breath is catching in his chest from sheer terror of the inevitable, and he prays that it didn't show on his face. He tries to distract himself from Voldemort's slowly rising wand arm. What else did Dumbledore plan? How much of his life was actually real, and what was manipulated? Harry wants to close his eyes so he can't see the Elder Wand pointed at him, but that feels wrong. He's going to die, and he wants to do so with his eyes open.

Harry wants to live.

He watches silently as the Dark Lord's lips move in a familiar incantation, a green light forming on the tip of his wand. There is a roaring sound in his ears.

He always knew deep down that his loyalty would be his undoing.

The following flash of green light is almost welcome.

_Bang! Bang! Bang!_

Harry jerks awake in near total darkness. "What the...? he mutters, confused. Through the grating on the door, thin rays of light dimly illuminate what was unmistakably the interior of his cupboard.

He should have died. He had died. He took a Killing Curse to the chest, and now he's apparently _in his cupboard_.

Another loud bang jolts him out of his stupor. "Get up! _Now_!" his aunt's familiar and impatient voice accompanies the banging, and Harry can do nothing but stare at the moving shadows on the grate in shock, because _what?_

As he hears her sharp footsteps move towards the kitchen, his brain finally catches up. The sleepiness in his eyes disappears almost instantly, and Harry almost upends the shelf above his head in a mad scramble to get his glasses before roughly shoving them on his face. With the world once again coming into focus around him, he violently swears under his breath, because yes, he is once again in the musty, cramped, spider filled cupboard under the stairs of Number 4 Privet Drive.

_What._

He goes to open the cupboard door, lest Aunt Petunia come back, and promptly begins to hyperventilate at the sight of his outreached hand. Merlin, Harry knows that being in his cupboard means he was probably around ten years old, _but this_? he thinks, looking at the tiny, shaking hand that seemingly belongs to him, _this is more than a little difficult to accept_.

He bursts out of the cupboard, tripping over his own feet in his panic, and runs straight down the hall to the bathroom mirror, ignoring his aunt's calls. The house looks the same as ever, but there are minor things Harry can't help but notice.

There's no hole in the plaster wall across from his cupboard, and the armchair that Aunt Petunia used to cover it up is still in its original position. When they were fourteen, Harry was locked in his bedroom for nearly a full week after Dudley blamed its sudden appearance on him. The carpets, which Harry was sure Dudley ruined while playing inside with his skateboard, are still ornate and well-worn, and all the picture frames on the walls display a younger version of Dudley.

Slamming the bathroom door open, Harry shoves the paraphernalia on the bench aside and hoists himself up so he can get a good view of the body he is currently inhabiting.

_Oh no._

There, staring back at him with wide, panicked green eyes, is a small eleven year-old boy with scruffy black hair and round wireframe glasses.

He raises a hand to touch his own face and the and the boy in the mirror mimics him. Hand shaking, he slowly pulls his messy fringe back. There, hidden under his hair, is his lightning bolt scar. He stares at the image, unmoving. He can hear Uncle Vernon yelling at him from the kitchen, and Harry can't bring himself to care.

He should be dead, but here he is, just shy of eleven years old, confused and very much alive.

He is alive. A second later, he has another realisation.

He is alive _and so is everybody else._

Cedric, Sirius, Dumbledore, Snape, Lupin, Tonks, Fred, Dobby, _everybody_. He bites back the hysterical laughter bubbling up in his throat. He can save them. He has been given this second chance, and he'll take it with open arms. Letting his fringe drop back over his scar, he straightens his back and meets his own eyes in the mirror. His breathing is calmer now, and Harry can see his resolve reflected in them.

This time around will be better.

" _Boy_! Get over here, _now!_ " his uncle's voice is nearing dangerous territory, so Harry stops his train of thought in favour of not keeping his relatives waiting any longer. After all, he has plenty of time to think things through.

Lifting his head high, Harry makes his way back to the kitchen where his irate aunt and uncle are waiting for him.

Perhaps this - not the Horcrux in his scar or his mother's love - is the power the Dark Lord knows not.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And off we go! It's gonna be a long ride, so strap yourselves in.

**Author's Note:**

> *Clears throat*  
> Hello and welcome to my comprehensive guide on how not to write a oneshot.  
> This started off as a cracky one-shot and devolved from there. Like, how? I even amaze myself sometimes.
> 
> Thank you for reading (and leave a kudos if you enjoyed)!
> 
> Go ahead and leave an idea or a theme you'd like to see in the comments :D


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